Information Brief 2012-17

Second-Year College Re-Enrollment

among ACT-tested high school graduates who immediately enrolled in a four-year institution

For seven years, we tracked the progress of a group of ACT-tested 2003
high school graduates who enrolled in a four-year college in fall 2003.
This brief focuses on the re-enrollment status of these students one
year after starting college (in fall 2004).

As shown in the figure below, more than three-fourths of the students
(77%) returned to the same four-year institution for a second year,
while 11% enrolled in a different institution.

Year 2 Re-Enrollment Status

Note: Based on National Student Clearinghouse data for a stratified random sample of 18,860 ACT-tested 2003 high school graduates who enrolled in a four-year college in fall 2003. The sample was weighted to be representative of the entire 2003 ACT-tested graduating class who immediately enrolled in college. For students enrolled in multiple institutions in fall 2003, initial institution type was based on the institution from
which the student ultimately earned the highest degree by the end of the seven-year study and/or in which the student had enrolled for the greatest number of fall terms during the study. In the sample, less than 1 percent of the students were initially enrolled in more than one institution.